


Breathe

by gypsiangel



Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Supernatural elements/psychic abilities, mentions past child abuse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-11-18
Updated: 2014-11-19
Packaged: 2018-02-26 04:46:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,158
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2638586
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gypsiangel/pseuds/gypsiangel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When they were teenagers, Penelope Garcia saved her life by making her disappear off the grid to start over. Now, years later it was happening again and she didn't have anyone else to turn to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hi again! :D Here's another fic that I drug up and wanted to share. This is another original character that I use a lot... She's been with me for a very long time and she's my form of therapy so the poor thing goes through a myriad of bad things in every story I do with her. She's definitely one that will show up in other stories, so don't be alarmed if/when that happens. Anyway, thanks for reading and any feedback is welcome, though negative comments will be ignored...  
> Another quick note: I don't really like the title, so it'll probably change. :P

 

            _Fire. Heat. Burning. Burning! The smell of fabric melting to skin as the flames licked up her legs made her gag and cough. The accelerant had been poured on her while she was sleeping, the poison the man had injected into her neck keeping her docile until the very end. He waited until she was coming out of it to light the match. She was tied to a stake in the middle of a clearing, her wrists raw from fighting with the bindings he’d kept her in for days… weeks? She’d lost count of time, everything blurring into a horrible haze of pain and fuzzy periods where she didn’t know up from down, inside from out._

_“Thou shall not suffer a witch to live.” The words were spoken loud enough for her to hear them over the crackle of the fire that was rapidly eating up the hay and kindling at her feet. “I’ve done my part, now it’s time for the cleansing fire to do its will. Go with God, child.”_

_The pain overwhelmed everything else and she couldn’t keep back the throaty scream of agony as her sweater caught, then her hair._

            Serena woke up screaming and fighting with her blankets, kicking at the sheets that had wrapped around her legs. Out of habit, she stifled the cries and huddled back against the wall her bed was positioned against. Hugging her knees to her chest, she worked on calming her breathing. Her eyes burned and she felt like her skin was two sizes too small, hot and uncomfortable. Shivering, she looked around the rented room and catalogued everything, compulsively making sure that she was alone and no one had been in her space while she slept.

            The wooden chair was still underneath the dead bolted door, wedged to make sure that if someone managed to pick the locks, they’d still have a hard time getting in. Her eyes went to the window and she had a moment of spiked terror. The curtains moved just a little in an invisible breeze and she tried to remember if she put the stick in the track so if it was opened, it would only move a couple inches. Heart in her throat, she gathered her courage and darted to the thick drapes, flinging them open to stare at the closed glass. A ghost of warm air filtered across her bare legs and she relaxed. It was just the heater. She started to close the curtains again when her gaze caught a figure standing in the shadows of the park across from the Victorian she’d claimed as home for the time being.

            Tall and bulky, the man was dressed in black and blended almost seamlessly into the tree he was leaning against. Her eyes knew what to look for, however, and she saw him. He straightened and separated from the shadows, raising a black gloved hand to the ball cap on his head to tip his hat. Her blood froze in her veins and she stepped back, swishing the curtains back into place with more force than necessary. She felt like she wanted to be sick, what little dinner she’d managed the night before turning to churning acid that threatened to come back up.

            Retreating to the on-suite bathroom that she’d paid extra for, Serena closed and locked that door too before she started the bathwater and undressed. Feeling exposed but frozen, she slipped into the near scalding water and hugged her knees to her chest again. What was she going to do? She’d already run clear across the states twice to get away from him and he followed, bringing the nightmares and the knowing with him. A fresh wave of tears washed over her and she started sobbing, burying her face in the wet skin of her knees.

            She’d tried so hard to push it all away, to not acknowledge that freakish part of her that knew things that she shouldn’t, that could see underneath the surface. She worked from home, honing her hacking and writing skills to keep herself fed without having to leave the sanctuary of her cottage in the hills. The dreams were harder to control, but she figured out that if she wrote everything down in a journal to get it out of her head, that it wouldn’t stick around as long.

            Serena had tried meditation, yoga, belly dance, trance music, tai chi, and sensory deprivation and had found a mixed routine that had helped. It had brought her to a state of being that she could not only survive the ‘gifts’ that had been activated when she was too young to remember, but could function more or less normally. She’d done all her research on the subject, from the fluffy crap that sounded like a novel written by teenage girls, to the text-book analysis tomes that detailed the phenomenon. None of it had been completely accurate, but all of it had pieces that fit. The biggest theory she’d come across was that psychic ability was usually brought on by severe emotional or physical trauma- more specifically head injuries.

            She fit that bill a little too well; emotional and physical trauma had been a staple of her early years. And the man that had activated her ‘gifts’ was back in her life and she knew that he was just waiting for the opportunity to finish what he started.

            Unable to stand sitting in the bathtub any longer, Serena washed and climbed back out of the claw-foot tub only marginally calmer. She dried off and pulled her thick flannel robe on, belting it tightly around her waist before stepping back out into her room. She crossed to the desk and pulled out her cell phone. Opening her contacts, she looked at the smiling picture next to her best childhood friend. Penelope Garcia, technical analysis expert for the FBI and the girl that had saved her life when she’d been fourteen. At seventeen, Penelope had risked everything to get her off the grid and in a safe place by using her surprisingly huge network of friends and contacts that were in place just for that reason.

            Her heart heavy at the thought of dragging her friend back into the mess, Serena didn’t know what else to do. Penny was the only person she could think of that could help- that would understand. It was three-thirty in the morning; far too early or too late to make contact, depending on what end you’re looking at. A glance at the messy bed assured her that she wouldn’t be able to go back to sleep. She moved to the tiny kitchenette and put on the teakettle, reaching for the stash of tea she kept in a neat pile next to the singe serve coffee packs and agave syrup on the counter.

            Opening her laptop, she sat down and started journaling her dream while she waited for daylight.

*~*~*~

            “Well, hello, Doll-face, it’s been a while,” Garcia answered her personal phone cheerfully, happy to see her old friend’s name in the caller-id, the gently smiling face popping up on the screen.

            “Hi, Penny, are you somewhere you can talk?” Fingers stilling on the keyboard, the blonde tech frowned at the hushed and tight tone of her friend’s voice.

            “What’s up?” Immediately on alert, she stopped all activity and listened to the hitch in Serena’s breathing as the other woman tried to gather courage and strength.

            “I-I need help. I’m so sorry, Penny! I don’t want to drag you into this, but I don’t know where else to go. No one else would believe me and I can’t… oh God, I can’t go through it again. I couldn’t survive it this time, I wouldn’t want to. Promise me that if he does take me, you…” The words spilled out so rapidly that Garcia had a hard time following it.

            “Woah, woah, Serena! Honey, calm down.” Quick fingers suddenly shaking and brown eyes wide with alarm, Garcia turned her chair toward the door to her office just in time for Morgan to appear like a dark avenging angel that had sensed a disturbance in the energy web. Eyebrows lowered, he watched her in concern as she spoke into her headpiece. “He’s not going to take you. Where are you?”

            “I- I’m here in Virginia. I- I just ran. I c-coul-couldn’t stay and I didn’t know where else to go and I didn’t want to contact you before I got here just in case… He always knows where I am and who I talk to… he always did. Oh, God, Penny, I shouldn’t have called you, he’s going to know you’re helping me and he’ll know you’re the one that got me out before. I couldn’t stand it if you got hurt because of me. I-I-I…” The other voice was getting more and more upset, her breathing out of control as panic took over.

            “Serena Anne!” Morgan blinked at the sharp tone that came from his normally soft girl. “I am not going to get hurt, and neither are you. Give me your address and we’ll be there to get you. Don’t lie, because you know I can track you.”

            There was a momentary silence, then a shaky breath. “665 NE 87th Avenue, Quantico Virginia.”

            “Do not move and do not open the door until you hear my voice, got it?”

            “Yes.” There was a silence, then, “I love you, Penny.”

            “I love you too. Now don’t move and don’t answer the door. I’ll be there soon, baby.”

            ‘Do we need to gather everyone?” Morgan crossed the floor to touch a hand to her shaking shoulder. She nodded and looked close to tears.

            “I- I need to go to her and we can explain when I know she’s safe,” Garcia said, going into his arms for a brief hug.

            “We need to talk to Hotch and then go. He needs to know what’s going on.”

            “Okay, but we can’t wait too long. She’s in serious danger and we need to get her surrounded by scary people with guns, like, now.”

            “All right, then let’s go.”

*~*~*~*


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :) Thanks for reading, guys! I'm taking severe liberties with Garcia's background, but that's what fanfiction is all about, right?

 

*~*~*~*

            Serena sat in her locked room, in the back of the closet with her phone clutched in her hands, waiting for the knock on her door. Everything was packed and ready to go the moment Penelope showed up. She felt like she was suffocating, like there was a hand closing around her chest and slowly squeezing the air out. It had been nearly an hour and she felt like she was going to snap with the tension, waiting for the door to burst open by a screaming shadow to drag her back to hell,

            The knock, when it came, was firm and definitely not Penny. Frozen in terror, Serena shrank back into the corner, too terrified to call out. Then her friend’s voice came through the door, filtered by layers of wood and plaster. “Serena? Honey, it’s me. I’ve brought reinforcements so no one’s going to mess with you while we get you someplace safe.”

            Legs shaking so hard it was difficult to walk the few feet to the door, she placed her hand against the wood. “P-password?”

            “Squishy.” Serena pulled the chair out from under the doorknob and opened it, nearly liquid with relief as she fell into her best friend’s arms. She started sobbing the moment she was enfolded in the soft, sweet smelling essence she’d missed so badly.

            “Shh, darling, it’s okay. It’s okay, honey-baby, you’re safe.”

            It took her a moment to realize that they weren’t alone, and when she did, she shrank into herself, watching warily as they moved around her. “Baby, this is Derek Morgan, Aaron Hotchner, and Emily Prentiss. I work with them at the BAU and they’re here to make sure you’re safe. They’re cool.”

            “You’re safe,” the tall well-built man introduced as Derek Morgan said with a reassuring twist to his lips and slipped past the women to gather her bags, handing them over to the dark haired woman standing behind them in the hallway.

            “We’re all clear’s let’s get you out of here.” Serena nodded and allowed Penelope to lead her out into the bright sunlight. Wincing as the light seared her eyes, she tried to make herself look as small as possible as she was ushered into the backseat of the huge SUV.

*~*~*~

            “I don’t know how much of this you’ll believe,” Serena told the gathered group of people as they sat around the huge table in the conference room. She was sitting next to Penelope, her hand firmly encased in the soft grip. She avoided looking at their faces, keeping her eyes on the table in front of her. “It’s not really something I advertise and I definitely don’t want it to leave this room.”

            “If it pertains to the reason you’re in danger, we need to put it in our reports,” the older man that had been introduced as David Rossi told her bluntly, his dark eyes compassionate but leaving no room for bullshit. He smiled and it took years off his face, adding charm and oddly, grace. “Besides, we hear a lot of strange things.”

            “When I was eight, my mother…” her voice broke and she touched a visibly shaking hand to her forehead. She hadn’t told anyone about this in nearly ten years and the words seemed like they were stuck. She flinched when Penelope stroked a hand down the side of her hair, then her shoulder. “I don’t know if I can do this.”

            “When my girl was eight, her mother married an abusive and sick man that got it in his head that Serena was demon spawn. He systematically beat, starved, humiliated, and tortured her until she was ten years old and someone from child services was finally called.”

            “I was institutionalized for almost three years after I was taken away. In the process of… of… breaking me, he opened a door in my head that I couldn’t close again. I couldn’t handle anyone touching me, I had horrible nightmares that had nothing to do with my own trauma. I _knew_ things that I shouldn’t. I couldn’t sleep or eat, I was overwhelmed by the smallest things. Most of the medications they tried didn’t do anything, it just made it worse. I spent nearly a year in heavy sedation because I would have screaming fits whenever anyone came near me. I was combative and unresponsive.”

            “They called in my father as her doctor,” Garcia told the group, looking at Hotch, who she knew was the one that needed to believe them. He actually worked _with_ her instead of just throwing medication at her hoping it would stick. He was one of the rare ones that had an open mind to possibilities outside of the norm. After a few sessions with Serena, he knew that something wasn’t right.”

            “Studies have shown that a percentage of people who have survived severe physical and emotional trauma develop what some might call psychic abilities,” Reid spoke up in the lull as the two women tried to find the right wording to explain without sounding too out there. “Especially after head trauma or near death experiences. There isn’t much in mainstream science about it, most psychologists and legitimate scientists discount it as a mixture of mental illness and caregivers taking advantage.”

            Serena locked eyes with the young agent and the desolate anguish he saw in her blue eyes made him swallow hard. “I wish that was it, Dr. Reid. I really, really wish that was it. Then I could be medicated and everything would be fine.”

            “Wait a minute,” Morgan interrupted, holding his hands out, eyebrows up in disbelief. “You’re saying that you’re a psychic?”

            “I love you dearly, sexy britches, but if I hear that tone out of your mouth when you’re talking about my girl, I will smack you so hard your eyeballs rattle,” Garcia snarled, pointing a polished finger in his direction. Her face was red and it was obvious that she took everything to do with her young friend very seriously.

            “It’s okay, Penny,” Serena said and laced her fingers with hers. She could feel the unease and the defensiveness creeping into the hacker and she knew that it wouldn’t help their cause. “That’s why I didn’t want to come for help. I keep to myself, I have a quiet life in a quiet little corner of the world. Penny’s the only one that knows about what I can do, I don’t use this… this… thing for any kind of gain.”

            “No one is saying that you do,” Hotch soothed gently, watching her growing distress. He hesitated, then pushed, “We need to know the rest of the story.”

            “Arthur, Penny’s father, worked with me for nearly three months. He slowly weaned me off the drugs they were using to keep me docile, and then we got to the heart of the problem. I proved to him, over and over and over that I was truly picking up things that I shouldn’t be able to know. That time in my life isn’t very clear. All I really remember is finally being understood, finally looked at like a human being. He really helped me. As soon as I was cleared, he arranged for me to be released into his custody and I went to live with Penny’s family.”

            “I finally had a little sister that I could take care of and teach everything I knew,” Penelope smiled softly, stroking Serena’s arm. “It was hard at first because she hated being touched. She would have the worst nightmares, but when my mom or dad wen to wake her up, she’d fight and climb under the bed where no one could reach her. Tiny little thing fit into the damnedest places.”

            “One night, I’d had enough to watching her go through it alone and I crawled under the bed with her.” She shook Serena’s hand lightly, “And since you’re staying with me until this all blows over, I’m telling you now that I’m stuffing everything I can under my bed. If you go under there, I won’t fit and I won’t let you go by yourself.”

            “I only hide in cupboards, Penny, so you should be okay,” Serena joked dryly, but didn’t really want to admit how close to the truth it was. It was habit more than anything, but she felt safer in the smaller, hidden places where no one else could see her or be able to come in after her.

            Reid was watching her with a strange look on his expressive face and she avoided looking at him. He knew something about hiding, about being the smallest and easiest target for those bigger and meaner. “What happened to make you have to run?”

            Serena focused on the unit chief, locking eyes with his amber orbs and momentarily getting lost in the solid strength he exuded. She swallowed hard and broke eye contact. “I’d been with Penny and her family for a year when I started getting letters from him; from my stepfather. When I was taken away, he’d been out of the house and they hadn’t been able to find him. I had nightmare after nightmare about him coming to find me, to take me back. Only this time, he’d torture me to death. It had been four years, but I recognized the handwriting. There was no return address and nothing to even prove they were from him.” Her voice trailed off and she closed her eyes briefly before starting again.

            “He knew where I was. The letters were dropped off at my home, in the mailbox without a return address or postage. He was on our front porch, he knew where I went to school, and he everything about the people who had adopted me into their family. The adoption papers had been signed and turned in- I was going to have a real family.”

            “You _have_ a real family, baby.” Penelope stroked her back. “I still have the papers in a lockbox that Daddy left for me. I couldn’t… I didn’t tell him that I knew where you were. I knew that if anyone knew, then that bastard could get to you though us. It was the hardest secret that I ever had to keep.”

            Chest restricting with grief and guilt, Serena swallowed around the lump in her throat. “I’m so sorry, Penny.”

            “Don’t even think about being guilty, baby.” Garcia blinked her heavily mascaraed eyes to try to keep the tears at bay. “I wouldn’t change a minute of it. It kept you safe and out of his reach.”

            Taking another deep, steadying breath, Serena looked around the table at the agents that her friend considered family and continued her tale. “The last straw was my service dog. Arthur had gotten him for me right after I was released from the hospital. We were still in training, learning together. He was a lab mix, huge and rather clumsy. We hit it off immediately and he was very protective of me. I… I came home from a trip to the mall with Penny and he was in my bed. He’d… he’d been gutted and left for me to find. I’d left him at home because I wanted to… I wanted to be normal for a little while.”

            “I took care of all of the documents she needed,” Garcia said very quietly, no doubt pulling up her own memories of that horrible day when they’d come in laughing and joking about something so silly and had found something so horrible waiting for them. “I wasn’t as good then as I am now, of course, but I knew people. I got her out and safe. She disappeared and the threats stopped.”

            “He just stopped? There was no further harassment, no demanding where she went, nothing?” Morgan was focusing on the details of the case rather than the young woman’s claims of being psychic. He wasn’t the type to discount such things, but he wasn’t going to jump on the bandwagon right away. They needed to focus on the real threat here- which was a sicko that wanted to hurt someone his princess really loved. He would be intent regardless, but there was something to be said for personal motivation. If the unsub was fixated on someone Garcia loved, then he would by default be fixated on Garcia. That was not an option.

            Garcia shook her head. “No. It was weird because I expected him to freak out and try to get the info out of us. He just faded out like he knew that Serena was gone and nothing he did was going to make us tell him where she was.”

            “What brought him back to your trail,” Prentiss wondered out loud. “All of these years and there was nothing, now all of a sudden he knows where you are again. What changed?”

            Serena opened her palm in frustrated confusion. “I don’t know. I haven’t done anything different, I barely even leave my house, and any of my online activity is very well hidden. I had a good teacher.” The sly smile slid across her face as a bit of relief to the lines of worry that had claimed her pretty face.

            “You know it, baby,” Garcia grinned back before explaining to the others, “Serena’s been my protégé since just after she came to live with us. Then I taught her more through the years, giving her sources and lectures over the web. She’s almost better than I am now.”

            “Whatever, you’re still the master, Penny,” Serena nudged her with her elbow, but there was a slight blush that crossed her cheeks. “But I’m pretty damn close behind.”

            “Flattery will get you everywhere, darling.”

            Hotch looked at the clock and closed his notebook. “We need to close this down for the night. Garcia, I want you to gather some things and go to a hotel for the night…”

            “No hotel,” Morgan jumped in abruptly. “I don’t want either of them out of sight until this bastard is caught and I don’t think it’s a good idea to put either one in protective custody. I have plenty of room at my house. That way I… we… can keep a close eye on security. It’s easier in familiar surroundings.” Garcia’s smile softened when he winked over at her, a warmth creeping up her neck the way it always did when he was being super sweet.

            “That’s a good idea,” Hotch agreed after a moment. “We can all take turns staying over for extra security. I want to work on the buddy system- safety in numbers.”

            “I’ll take the first couple days,” Reid offered. “I don’t have to arrange for childcare or anything like that. It’ll take me about a half hour to get my things together.”

            “All right. Everyone back here at normal time tomorrow morning.”

*~*~*~


End file.
